“But you were from enemy clans. How did you reconcile that?”
“The moment I survived, Kravis’s clan became my clan.”
“So, Clan Cleave?” she asked.
He finished screwing something into the cylinder before he sat it aside. “No, Isobel Nott. Once I earned my helmet, with Kravis at my side, I returned to my birth clan. I killed the qon and those loyal to him. I then challenged the qon of our clan in the same night—cleaving two great clans and rebuilding them into one.”
“Qon is a leader like…”
“Exxo says that the closest word you have to qon isking.”
Her lips parted in silent surprise. “You killed two kings in a single night and took their place? Are you telling me that you’re…”
“I am Ved Qon Cleave,” he stated simply, as if the information he’d just imparted was not extraordinary.
“Ved Qon Cleave,” she repeated. “The King of Cleave.”
He rumbled with satisfaction. “Vay, and Kravis was my general.”
“Was?”
His voice became grittier, deadlier. “Before I was pulled into the vector tear that brought me here, I saw his ship get attacked. He couldn’t have survived.”
“Oh, Ved,” she murmured as her heart broke for him anew. “I’m so sorry. After everything…”
“It’s why I must repair my ship quickly. I have a blood vendetta to settle. I will kill every member of this Clan Rax. Blood for blood,” he growled. “An ocean of it for a drop.”
Isobel had never had an enemy—not like that. Her mother, her sister-in-law, and her father hadn’t been killed by some adversary, yet she understood exactly how Ved felt. If she had some entity to hold accountable for their deaths, she’d do the same. Even without such a thing, she was often angry at the world and at God.
“I’ve experienced loss, too,” she murmured. “Not in such a way, but when I was only four, my mother passed away from a bad fever. Hetty, my brother’s wife, died giving birth to my niece, Clara. And just two years ago, my father died after falling ill and declining rapidly. That loss was the hardest for me. He was a great man, and I loved him very much. He allowed me certain liberties to be myself and was full of wisdom.”
Isobel tried to imagine telling her father about Ved. Once he overcame his initial disbelief and shock, she thought he might have been just as curious as she was. And… “I think you would have liked my father. He was a skilled hunter and very clever.”
Ved tilted his head as he listened to her. He’d stopped working the moment she’d started speaking. “Your heartbeat changes when you speak of them,” he said after a long moment.
“You canhearmy heartbeat?” It somehow seemed too vulnerable, too intimate, and she instinctively crossed her arms over her chest.
“And see it beating in your chest, if I want.”
“How often do you do that?” she managed. She was certain that if humans had such an ability, it would be considered impolite or improper to use it. If not downright scandalousand sinful.
“It pleases me,” was all he said.
She blew out a breath and willed herself not to blush at the thought. “There have been many revelations today, Ved Qon Cleave. I’m not sure I can take many more.”
He huffed. “You are telling untruths,” he said. “You are far too curious to be finished.”
It had only been a short time of getting to know each other, yet he knew her so well. But something nagged at her, a familiar fear. “My curiosity doesn’t bother you?”
“Why would it?” he retorted, moving on to another cylinder. “I’m as curious about you as you are about me, Isobel Nott.”
As they returned to their work, she couldn’t help but think that no one had ever said something quite so meaningful to her.
Chapter 15
Isobel
Over the last several days, Isobel had fallen easily into the routine of helping Ved whenever she could.
